SEE THE FRINGE FOR FREE

Across the month of September we have a great program of free events across the city. ranging from events and family friendly activities to comedy, theatre and music till late. There are now lots more reasons to get involved in Sydney Fringe this year and support your cities independent artists.

Come down every Friday night and catch a slice of the Fringe Shows to come, with the Fringe Showcase. Previewing new shows every week, there will always be something new to see. Follow this with some open mic comedy and your night is sorted.

1st - 30th Sept CITY OF CIPHERSRadio Free Alice

Floating like paper clouds above the merchantise at Radio Free Alice- one of Sydney's foremost cult literature,music and film specialists- are Samantha Tidbeck's obsessive portraits of anybody she likes: film stars, criminals,total strangers, celebrities, nobodies, reimagined and often unrecognisable within a new context.What do we see when we look at another person? The artist's blind contour technique and random fascination with nobody in particular breaks open the portrait genre with funny,distorted yet beautiful and surprising results.

Inspired by the 19th century paintings of Jacques Joseph Tissot, NIDA Costume and Design students have produced stunning costumes, in paper and fabric respectively!

Displaying the result of their research project, NIDA Properties and Objects students present life-size sculptures in the ancient Greek style.

2nd - 30th Sept - 3pm - MidnightGREEN PARK SUNDAYSGreen Park Hotel

Sundays at the Green Park are a local institution. An afternoon of great music and even greater people, good vibes are guaranteed. In line with Fringe, we've programmed a roster of rotating local favourite DJ's from 6pm, regulars include Hamo Tevita, Adam Love and Kate Monroe. To sweeten the deal, happy hour kicks in from 5-7 pm $6 house spirits, beers & wines every Sunday.

After leaking private conversations, Amazon's "Alexa" is not to be trusted. MIT's wearable device can hear the words you say in your mind. Camouflage is now being used to hide from face-recognition technology. In the post-privacy world, security and personal data on the Internet are becoming increasingly corrupted; humanity is unresponsive and is posting memes as a coping mechanism.

EF18: Your privacy is very important to us investigates the ethics of personal data collection and the uncertainty it permeates for the individual and broader society. Personal data collection has transformed the way we live our very lives, for example, location devices allow us to send our Ubers ETA to our friends and family, computing devices are integrated with our everyday objects such as our Fitbit and Smart Fridge and cookies allow online shopping to be effortless. The same technologies benefit Tech giants such as Facebook, who recently leaked 87 million users private data during the Trump campaign. Patrons were shocked and horrified by these this, however, continue to use the social platform on a regular basis.

Do we truly cherish our personal data? Will the evolution of AI shape a more connected and sustainable society? How should organisations ensure kept data serve the greater good? What does our future look like? Electrofringe showcases 20 upcoming artists as part of EF18: Your privacy is very important to us, to celebrate our 20 year anniversary.

Starting the night with some open-mic and rounding it up with the fabulous DJ Glamour Toads (AKA Frida Las Vegas and Katie-Louise Nicol-Ford). They’ll be bringing all the nineties and noughts teenage pop feels to the d-floor, serving Romy & Michelle vibes for a non-stop dance-a-thon that’s a mix CD of Video Hits, So Fresh and Hit Machine party bangers, every Saturday night throughout September.

This year, grade 5 and 6 students from Newtown Public School headed off to the Sydney Airport for a behind the scenes tour! The classes artwork about their exciting adventure will be on show at The Sydney Fringe Pop-up Gallery at 92 Oxford St.

"Sydney Airport is excited to support the Fringe Festivals – Kids Program by hosting an Airside Adventure" Sally Cummin, Sydney Airport.

13th Sept - 6pm SO FAR SO GOODVandal

An exciting fundraising collaboration between Art Pharmacy Consulting, curator Amy Roser, and a selection of incredible Australian creatives, undertaken to heighten dialogue around mental health.

The brainchild of local artist and curator Amy Roser, So Far So Good is a text-hibition that aims to continue the dialogue about mental health, raise funds for charity and bring light to a topic that still lives in the dark.

The contemporary group show will feature text-based works from a dozen high profile local and international artists. Guests will enjoy music from local creative agency St O'Donnell, beverages from Tasmanian Nonesuch Distillery, as well as a vegetarian feast .

Guests will be invited to provide a donation on the door. Additionally, the Sydney-based Virtual Immersive will be creating an interactive and digital work, which will allow attendees to donate throughout the night.

The funds will be going to local charities that actively encourage conversations on mental health. batyr is a local mental health charity created by, and run for young people that 'smashes the stigma around mental health'. One Wave is a non-for profit surf community group 'tackling mental health issues'.

"I am passionate about encouraging an open dialogue about mental health. So many people suffer in silence even though it's such a widely shared experience," says So Far So Good curator, Amy Roser.

"This exhibition is about bringing together a diverse range of strong artistic voices to create a show that says 'you're not alone' in a way that is light-hearted" Roser adds.

This year we are encouraging you all to break out of your suburb, get out of the inner city and explore some awesomeness just a super short train ride away. We are heading to Liverpool and are taking over the old Northumberland Arcade with pop-up performance spaces, galleries and creative businesses featuring local Western Sydney artists plus an outdoor animation laneway cinema and free gigs at the nearby Macquarie Bistro.

Auroras bleed fire across the firmament, dancing lights that flare in the night sky, the science abandoned to their mesmerising beauty. Random columns of fluorescence or tag-along shimmers that lure the unsuspecting to their end, the dark can come alive with light, much of it unexplained.

The Night Garden that blooms but once a year and only at night in the back streets of St Peters is aflame with this flickering fire. Light sculptures, installations and projections burnish the inky darkness, creating a sensory, evocative world that tingles with electromagnetic charge and the shiver of the unknown.

From the Min Min lights to Area 51, from will o’ the wisps to the supernatural orbs of chhir batti, ghost lights are phenomena that pluck your eyes to the heavens. They live in the rich realm of phantasmagoria, superstition and conspiracy leaking from every angle.

On Friday 21st September, in association with Trolley’d, Arcade Screenprinting, Percy Jacks – and in memory of The Forge –Tortuga Studios is proud to present some of Sydney’s most intriguing artists as they tend to their garden beneath the aurora.

Follow the fire in the sky into a world that wears the paranormal like a tight-fitting shirt, bulging with suspense and shiny lustre.

The night garden blooms at Tortuga Studios, its light trails glinting in the sultry dusk of Applebee and Hutchinson Streets in St Peters.

Integrated with the Chinese traditional element "Journey to the West" in conjunction with the art and drama structure of "The Tempest", the show tells Chinese stories with Western art value transmission system.

8th Sept - 4pm EATS BEATS STREETKensington Street Festival Village

Head on down to Kensington Street for a massive day of music, performance, food and art. It’s a celebration of all things street, so we're closing off the street to traffic and setting up a pop-up festival bar so you can kick back for the afternoon.

Watch leading Sydney based street artists create three new wall commissions as a crew paint a number of works to auction for charity on the day.

Soak it all up with a live soundtrack created on the spot inspired by the works as they are made, and of course partake in all the tasty treats the Kensington Street eateries have to offer.

22nd - 23rd Sept POP TEMPLE92 Oxford St

A unique space created for the gathering of community with a specific intention - to offer a peaceful, meditative hideaway in the heart of the city where the realms of the mysterious and the sacred can be accessed. What holds it together? Pop music of course... A sacred space for reflection FREE for all.

OPENING HOURS

Saturday 22 Sept11:00AM - 1:00PM2:00PM - 4:00PM

Sunday 23 Sept1:00PM - 4:00PM

27th Sept - 8pmDRAG BINGO WITH PRADA CLUTCH Green Park Hotel

Head down to the Green Park on the last Thursday of Fringe season to add some ballsy excitement to the end of your week with Drag Bingo.

Hosted by the fabulous and multi-talented Prada Clutch, one of Australia's most sought after drag queens and all-round entertainer. Balls drop at 8pm, with fabulous prizes to be won!

Choreographer, performance maker, actor and ambassador for Deaf Australia, Andy Dexterity sings with the world no matter what form he finds it in.

Come and be swept up by the ever enchanting Andy Dexterity every Thursday night from 10.30-11.30pm at Fringe Club.

22nd Sept - 6pm SPRING-ROLLRoof-top Roller Rink at Broadway Sydney

Join us for this one night event at the roof-top roller rink. Surrounded by glittering city views, DJ Glamour Toads will be spinning funky disco tunes to help you dance the night away. With Innocent Bystander Moscato, Young Henry’s tinnies and grilled burgers to keep you nourished.

With more of our favourite fringe performers to be announced, our friends at Bailey Nelson also have some exciting giveaways, so roll in quick if you don’t want to miss out

Access to the pop-up park and all the above is free, but skating on the roller-rink is ticketed as normal.

16th Sept - 8pmSCRUFFAMUDDA Moshpit

To call Scruffamudda just a musician would be a serious disservice to his diabolical art, you the listener & music in general. Scruffamudda is a complete physical & psychological experience. A mashup of music with elements of electro, hip-hop, punk & pop. Scruffamudda's live show is as outrageous as it is ingenious, an hilarious interactive experience that features percussion, synths, guitar, ukulele, vocals, children's toys, gadgets & practically anything that makes noise. All this from a head full of chaos, a beard woven from pixie dreams & hands made of Lego.

1st Sept - 4.45pm FRINGE IGNITEOxford St Darlinghurst

29 GIGS ACROSS 11 SPACES

CURATED BY THELMA PLUM

The official opening celebration will take over our Oxford Street Hub for one massive precinct party. Filling the street, shopfronts, venues and spaces with live music and performance.

Showcasing 3 established Sydney Artists who use "exact sensorial imagination" in watercolour, acrylics and oils.

Fiona Campbell: Trained and worked overseas with Liane Collot d'Herbois and Gerard Wagner. Painted wall murals for Sydney Curative homes; holds workshops regularly n biographical life stages and world epochs, and has completed a Masters in Developing Imagination.

David Wansbrough: Has held numerous solo exhibitions of large oil works here and oversea. He is currently a visiting Professor at Moscow University and lecture in Russia and Sydney. He has written several books on Poetry and Festivals.

Vanessa Snaith: Light, airy and expansive canvases in acrylic with subtle blends of colour. Vanessa's imaginative capacities are used as a painting teacher at Kamaroi Steiner School and training teachers for Sydney Rudolf Steiner College, as well as offering weekend workshops.